United We Stand, United We Will Prevail
by Malcolm Winchester v.2
Summary: Quick note I do not own Faliingskies, characters, or cannon, or Kaylee and Alyssa Characters as they are a friends and belong to the authors here on the website MRSMASON 2/ This story is about a group of teens who fight there way for so long until the 2nd Mass finds them. Agreeing they go on the adventure of the Second Mass finding if they have what it takes to survive./


"When the sun goes down, the darkness shall rise, and demons shall roam the Earth." The quote slowly roamed through my head as I continued to drive the truck, through the remains of the small town that I once had called my home, just barely a few miles outside of Boston where the woods met civilization. Continuing to drive slowly through the small town I couldn't help but smile softly as I felt like it was the old day, just driving through the streets heading into town for some supplies, but of course nothing was like normal. Everything was either destroyed or severely damaged. Vehicles were burned and rusted on the road or on the side, buildings were worn out and some crumbled and caved in from the constant bombardment, and the streets had entire craters from where the bombs fell.

Hanging a left down the road, I saw the town come into view, and I slowed down, watching and scanning every possible area I could in case of an ambush from either the aliens or the human survivors and scavengers just trying to get the upper hand. But I continued to slowly drive down the road and keep my eyes on alert watching for the slightest movement. Reaching the entrance of the town, both side of the road were covered and surrounded by buildings, connected side by side.

Being surrounded and easily able to be shot at made me feel uneasy and wishing I wasn't in the situation, but slowly I continued the drive on and looked around for the first possible place to scavenge and I saw it not too far ahead at the old, military recruiting station. Turning my head I saw Kaylee fast asleep as I continued to drive, slowly using my free hand, I shook her shoulder slightly trying to wake her up and she only twitched slightly. I shook her harder and finally she woke up, just she woke up slightly hostile as before I knew it, her Beretta 92FS was pointed and pressed into my neck and her finger hovered over the trigger.

"Kaylee it's me, it's me Malcolm put the gun down." I whisper to her and swallowed as she shakily put the gun down and looked around as her eyes scanned the area as well before she turned back to me and raised an eyebrow at me.

"Why we are at a recruiter's station, there won't be any supplies or anything that we need." She told me and stated matter of factly as she just turned her attention back to the window and the first few drops of rain splattered. Both of us looking up slowly, I saw the small scattered grey clouds and figured it wouldn't be a heavy rain, just scattered showers as they were dark and grey enough to produce a moderate amount of wet stuff to fall and moisture or soak whatever got in the rains way.

"Not necessarily supplies that are typical. They have stuff like clothes, water bottles, things that we can use to stay warm and stay supplied. Who knows maybe we will find a couple uniforms, tactical gear, weapons we don't know but it is a good place to start Kaylee." I mutter and look into her silver blue eyes, part of her strawberry blonde hair covering a side of her face before she turned away and just shook her head.

"Fine let's get it over with." She muttered before she opened the door and got out of the truck, into the slight rain filled air. Shaking my head but grinning slightly as that was her typically, I climbed out as well and locked the truck up, and activated the alarm system so if someone so much as touched it, the alarm would blare and go off. Before going inside we each did our own weapons check to make sure they were functional and loaded. I laid my rifle down across the hood of the truck, before reaching down and pulled out my Glock 17 with the tactical light under the barrel, pulling the slide back to make sure a full metal jacket, 9mm round was loaded into the chamber before pulling back and listened to the satisfying click then slid it back into my hip holster. Reaching back across the hood I grabbed my weapon of the day which was a M16A4 assault rifle. The rifle was custom just like a lot of weapons my father had left in the underground armory when we finally uncovered it the day the bombs fell and were trying to take shelter.

The M16 was modified tactically as one of the two that were inside of the locker along with countless other firearms varying from pistols to grenade launcher and everything in between. On the barrel was a quad rail for all of the modifications and attachments that were applied to it. On the bottom was a simple angled fore grip for easier comfort and grip of the rifle when firing, on the left side was a flashlight that was controlled by the grip, whenever the flashlight was turned on, all I had to do was squeeze the grip and the light would turn on, the right side of the barrel held a laser designator but in this world there was nothing to call in or designate. On top of the rail was the optic system installed, originally it had just an ACOG 4x magnifier optic system on it, but I had switched it out putting on a hybrid system with the holographic sight on the front, and in the rear a 3x magnifier which was currently cocked to the side not needing to engage long distance. And finally the prized possession was the 100 round beta drum magazine system that had been extremely hard to find, but was currently held in the the rifle holding a hundred 5.56mm hollow point bullets and one was in the chamber ready to fire. Satisfied with my equipment check I turned and waited for her to finish as well.

Hers was slightly longer but also because she carried more than I did. Having already checked her pistol earlier when she held it to my throat, she left it in her holster and checked her main weapon which was also her pride and joy as she always took it with her the Calinco M960 SMG that never left her side. Then she checked her secondary which was a SCAR-H heavy assault rifle. Also from my father s armory it was simpler but still had the edge. Had the basics like mine with the grip, flashlight and all but instead of a hybrid sight she just stuck with a thermal optic, and her magazine was a regular 20 round box magazine but held the more powerful 7.62mm round. Soon she was ready to go and had her weapons in place, the SCAR in her hands and she nodded to me.

"Stick together and let's sweep the area quick to make sure it's secure then we scavenge and get what we can, and move on to the next area that most likely isn't picked over. We'll avoid the big stores as they are a big risk of either an ambush or just picked clean of everything that was valuable." I quickly explained the game plan which received a roll of the eyes before we both raised our rifles and began to slowly make our way towards the building. It was quiet and the rain slowly began to gain momentum and came down in a sheet of rain not to heavy or hard to cause a storm environment though, and enough to make a presence of rain known.

Rushing to the door, I grabbed the handle and waited for her to approach as she aimed her rifle at the door ready to breach and clear. Swallowing and catching my breath, I calmed down and lowered my heart rate so I wouldn't miss anything, I waited a few seconds before making eye contact with her and she simply nodded her head. I nodded in return and yanked the door open as she quickly walked inside, and I quickly followed suit turning around and backing into the building watching the outside in case anything wanted to try and get the jump on us but nothing followed.

"Rears clear and good to go." I whisper and turn as I reach a hand out and turn the flashlight on before placing it back on the grip and squeezed it as light illuminated the hall from my rifle's barrel, and Kaylee did the same both of us looking down a long hall, doors on each side as bodies of both skitters and humans littered it, half of bodies stuck out of the doors as well. The stench of death and decay nearly made me gag but I steeled myself and slowly looked around before seeing on my right across the wall was a blood splatter, and laying on the ground was a kid, most likely in his late teens split in half as his two pieces were on opposite ends of the wall. "Fucking monsters." I whisper and close my eyes before slowly walking over to the kid and ran a hand over his face and closed his eyes giving him peace before walking back over to her.

"You take the right rooms, and I'll take the left. Meet up at the end of the hall then we'll work on grabbing things." She told me and I nodded in consent before slowly beginning to walk down the hall, parallel to her for the most part as we continued to go shoulder to shoulder and came to the first set of rooms. Turning right quickly rifle raised I saw a dead skitter halfway in the room, the desk was turned over and behind it missing a head, and a bloody slash mark across his chest was the remains of an Air Force recruiter in his uniform. Quickly making sure the room was clear, I turned and continued to walk down the hall and turned the next room to see the destroyed office of the Army section but nobody at all just two dead skitters. Finishing the sweep I arrived at the end of the hall that led to a door marked storage. Turning around I saw Kaylee finish up as well and came up me with a set of keys.

"After you." I smirk softly and chuckle before stepping to the side and let her through so she could unlock the door. While she began to go through the keys trying and testing each one to unlock the door, my rifle was aimed down the hall and towards the entrance. I still didn't trust the area and just wanted to be on the way so we could leave and be gone by now. We still had to head towards a gas station that was just outside of the town limits. Finally the satisfying click was heard as the door opened and she immediately ducked inside and I heard her body move softly almost like she was made of liquid.

"Clear." She shouted and I slowly lowered my rifle as I turned and entered the storage room to see all of the branches recruiting rewards shelves still mostly filled. Shirts, hoodies, water bottles, notepads, jackets, hats, beanies, flashlights, and so much more even a few blankets were in the corner and that just brought a smile to my face that slowly turned to a smirk. Slowly backing and leaning against one of the walls, bringing a foot up and resting it on a wall as well, my rifle hanging loosely as my right hand gripped the pistol grip letting it point towards the ground. A sense of gloating seemed to have been coming over me and Kaylee turned to see it. She rolled her eyes but was also smirking as she came over and punched me across the shoulder.

"Say it." I told her as I rubbed it but didn't budge as she did lose the bet. Seeing as we had been around and working with each other for a while. We had an unspoken deal between us and the other two that were back at the house, that if someone had been right during the bet or deal, they in turn had to say I told you so. Something that helped us joke and relieve the tension. She stared at me like she wanted to punch me but I kind of figured the best option was just to tease her more so she could smile or glare whichever made her feel better.

"You were right." She said and just smiled as she punched me again in the opposite soldier and I just smirked and winked. She smiled but soon we both walked over and began to grab some of the supplies I had pointed them out and carry them back out to the truck, placing them in the back seat of the cab. Thankfully we would be able to stay warm as a bunch of the warm clothes and blankets were still there, hell it didn't even seem the place was touched. Probably not many people would have checked it, the military it seemed wasn't as popular as it was before unfortunately which sucked with the wars that were going on. Grabbing a duffel bag off to the side. I grabbed several long and short sleeve shirts from all of the branches shelves and shoved them inside of the bag before moving over and grabbed a few water bottles and shoved them in as well. Zipping the bag up, I carried it over and tossed it into the truck as well. Stopping for a second and smiling softly to myself as I felt the rain pour down onto me, I grabbed my baseball cap and pulled it off using the bill to scratch my head for a second and put it back on. Looking around at the buildings surrounding me, all of a sudden a cocking noise was heard as something cold and metal pressed to the back of my head.

"Well looky what we have here." A man's voice called out as several more people appeared all with various weapons and surrounded me. One came up and yanked the Glock out of my holster, while another pulled the M16 from me and the sling over my head. Finally one more person came into my view and by the way he carried himself he seemed to be the ring leader. He was dressed in a pair of combat boots, pair of blue jeans that had several small holes in them, a plain black shirt with a denim jacket over it, a bandana across his face, some dark shades over his eyes and a ball cap on his head with short black hair. Dangling from his hip was a Desert Eagle, the .50 caliber variant to from the style and model he was carrying, while in his hands was a military grade Bushmaster ACR assault rifle. The people around me were going through the truck and just milling around as well, all eyes on me it seemed. Good, maybe they thought I was alone.

The man finally stopped about a foot away from me, and took off his shades, while he lowered the bandana down to his neck. His head came back up as I took in a sharp breath from his appearance. His eyes were a very dark brown, and the hat protecting them from the small amount of light shining made them look just pure black. A scar ran down from the corner of his right eye, past his cheek and stopped at his jawline as he just seemed to smirking at me like I was the catch of the lifetime. Finally he turned away and looked around, slowly feeling at ease, my mind began to wander about what he could want from me. While thinking to myself, out of the corner of my eye, the man nodded to a man then jerked his head in my direction. My brain not focused on that, took a few seconds to process it. My eyes shot opened and I was going to try and move, but too late as the crack of the rifle firing shot out and a sharp pain emerged from the back of my leg and exited through my front.

The surprise from the pain was too much for me to prepare for, and my leg gave out as I collapsed to the muddy ground getting my clothes dirty and muddy. My right hand dropped to my wound and tried to stop some of the bleeding, as my left began to drag me through the mud trying to reach my truck. The group of men burst into a roar of laughter of hoots and hollers like this was some sort of game. Dragging myself across the mud for several feet, finally my gloved hand felt the familiar sensation of a tire, reaching up, I gripped it the best I could before beginning to pull myself up. Turning my head to look behind me, it was in enough time to see a boot flying towards me and kicking my head, jerking and crashing against the tire. I was disoriented and everything exploded into spots and stars while a severe pain and throbbing replaced where the man had kicked my head. The kick threw me off and made me fall back into the mud which received another round of cheering from the group.

Taking several seconds to push the pain in the back of my mind, finally my eyes opened and I could think clearly without the pain from the injuries and wounds clouding my judgment. I reached my hand out and this time finally and slowly pulled myself to sit up and press my back against the tire and looked at the group of men who were staring at me like I was a slab of meat. The leader was having a grand old time and stood over me, lifting his leg slowly, he brought it down and began to apply pressure to the gunshot wound. A cry of pain escaped my lips and my right hand shot out and held my leg trying to relieve some of the pressure. A soft chuckle escaped the man's lip and crouched slowly to reach eye level with me.

"Son didn't your parents ever tell you not to go out by yourself?" He asked slowly and was just smiling more. All I could do was remain silent and watch, try to prepare for the next assault he would cause me and injure me more. His hand shot out and gripped the back of my head and bent it backwards as he was growling at me. "Answer me you piece of shit!" He yelled now. Not going to give him the satisfaction, I glared for a second before taking a deep breathe then spat a large loogie across his face. He brought his free hand up and wiped it across his face as he got the spittle off and shook his hand away. Letting go of my head, he backhanded me hard and the force caused me to fall back across the mud. The rain was beginning to come down heavier, and the beginning sounds of thunder being followed by lightning was soon saw and heard. My ball cap had been knocked off by this point and it was hard to look up fully as the rain kept splattering in my eyes. But managing to squint, I could see the man just standing over me as a clap of thunder sounded and lightning flashed behind him.

"Boss the storms coming, just leave him." One of his lackeys called out, growing nervous from the storm apparently. Everyone seemed to be shocked at this and stared between the boss and the lackey now. Even the man's eyes widened as he heard this and slowly began to turn his head. The lackey swallowed heavily and was about to speak when the man grabbed his Deagle and just shot the kid right then and there straight between the eyes like it was nothing. The body fell to the ground unceremoniously and the lifeless eyes seemed to be staring into mine as two of the others walked over and stripped him of his weapons, ammo, and gear. Fighting over who got his grenades and began to get into a fist fight.

"Say goodnight kid." The boss spoke to me again and pointed the hand cannon at my face and his finger was hovering over the trigger. My face flushed with relief and was just glad that they didn't know about Kaylee, she would be safe, come out and see my dead body. Then go on and go back home, to take care of my little brother, and tell Alyssa what happened. I didn't really care for my life, as long as they stayed alive it was all I could care for. Looking straight down the barrel, I stared defiantly and wouldn't give him the satisfaction of the look of fear or terror across my face, not even defeat. Slowly his finger began to press against the cold metallic trigger and pull. "Smile, and wait for the flash kid. He told me with one last snarky remark before pulling the trigger the rest of the way. One shot rang out loudly during the storm.

Kaylee's POV

 **Flashback**

" _Hey you think that Malcolm will be home?" Alyssa asked as she bumped into me. I didn't really acknowledge her as I continued walking away from the hell that was school. My mind off into a different setting, the day having been worse than usual probably the worst total. Continuing to walk down the street, past the chain link fence that wrapped around the schools property, school buses were driving by, kids shouting and screaming as it was out for the day and everyone was just smiling to themselves. The school was pathetic along with nearly everyone else, all they thought about were the most stupid things or they bullied and picked on the weak. All school was, was survival of the fittest and most popular, and if you weren't either you would be ripped to shreds in the social class._

" _Earth to Kaylee." Alyssa spoke again but this time socked me in my arm. This got my attention and made me growl at her slightly snapping out of my thoughts and turned to look at her. She was just looking at me expectantly and I hadn't been listening to her so I didn't know what she wanted. Not knowing what to do, but also wanting to look like I paid attention, I just smiled and gave her a thumbs up. She rolled her eyes again and this time hit me harder in annoyance. Grabbing my arm where she hit me, I felt go numb and dead which caused me to bite my lip. She had a hell of a hook that was for damn sure, could fight any boy in school and kick there ass with an arm tied behind her back. "I asked if you thought Malcolm might be home." She asked again and just looked to where we were going nearly reaching the end of the sidewalk so we could cross the street._

 _Thinking to myself, I honestly didn't know if he was home, he been called away early from school, something had happened apparently as he was escorted out by two men, both wearing army dress uniforms. He hadn't come back and answered my text or phone calls during and between classes and after my incident. So that meant that either something bad had happened to him and he was just avoiding calls, or that his phone had died and he was most likely at home now after picking Christopher up. Shrugging my shoulders, I looked left and right seeing no vehicles and began to walk across the street, stopping at the corner and turned to look at her. "Let's go find out, got nothing better to do, and maybe we can stay at his house again." I told her along with smiling slightly and we began to walk down the street._

 _It wasn't that far of a walk as he just lived down a block away, but even though he was close, he still drove to school after dropping off his little brother at the elementary school that was on the other side of town. Continuing to walk down the street, I saw his house at the corner and his truck was parked in the driveway instead of inside of the garage. Cocking my head to the side and raising an eyebrow, it was very rare and odd that he just parked in the driveway usually he just parked inside so he didn't have to worry about the truck being stolen. Also inside of the garage, where his father's and his own dirt bikes, along with an ATV were. They took them out when they went hunting and fishing, usually on weekends he took myself and Kaylee out since his father was overseas in Afghanistan._

 _Reaching the edge of his house where the sidewalk met the grass, we were about to turn and begin to walk towards his door when a loud engine caught my attention that was getting closer. Turning, a large yellow school bus appeared and turned down the street but stopped in front of his house as well. Opening the folding doors, the bus driver hollered and waved us over, both of us raising eyebrows but did as he asked and walked over to the bus where the doors were. The man was overweight having a large beer gut, a bald spot that he was covering with a large neon orange baseball cap, and in need of a bad shave. As we stood there the kids were getting rowdy and started screaming and yelling at each other, typical of a middle school bus. But the bus driver wasn't going to have any of it as he looked in his mirror to view the kids and his face turned red. He turned and began to yell at the kids to sit down and be quiet. For some reason just the way he yelled and acted rubbed me the wrong way and I wanted to do something but had to resist the urge not to. So I just cleared my throat._

" _Hey what did you want?!" I yelled at him to get his attention and he turned to look at me but didn't say anything. Just some rustling at the bus as someone got up and walked down the aisle of the bus before turning and walked down the steps. The kid was wearing some brown hiking boots, with dirt covered jeans, and a denim jacket that was buttoned up and had some dark brown and crimson splotches covering it, which meant it was dried up blood. But the kid just hopped off of the bus, the driver satisfied closed the door and sped off down the streets as kids bouncing around were seen through the back door. Looking down at the kid, a look of worry came across my face as I realized it was Christopher with a black eye and a bloodied nose. "Kid what happened to you?" I asked worriedly and lowered as he hugged me tightly not even responding. But he quickly then backed away and looked at me._

 _Of being his older sister and helping him out when either Malcolm didn't have a clue what to do, or he was just being a hard ass._

" _Come on, let's get you inside and changed so we can get you into some clean clothes, and also go see what your brothers doing and up to. Probably nothing good like he usually is." Alyssa chuckled the last part but stood up and smiled, as Christopher walked to the door and pulled out a key from his pocket and unlocked the door. Slowly walking inside of the home, I heard a voice from the kitchen. Alyssa walked inside last and closed the door behind us but it kind of was louder than should have, as it slipped from her hand. Grimacing at the sound, she looked apologetic to Christopher before leading him over to the stairs so they could go to his room and get him some clean clothes. Continuing to walk inside of the house, I followed the voice to see Malcolm leaning against a kitchen counter, his back to me and his cellphone to his ear._

" _Yes, Sir, thank you sir. I'll make sure to tell Christopher as well, thank you for your condolences, I'll see you another time. Goodbye sir." He told whoever was on the phone before hanging up and just placing the phone behind him on the counter. Watching him, something seemed off, he" I got picked on and stood up for myself, they kept calling me gay and that Dad was ashamed of me, why he kept going over to the war so he didn't have to be around me. I got tired of it and finally snapped, it wasn't a fair fight, four to one, but I managed to take two of them down before the other two pinned me and began to pummel me. The teachers came soon after, but I still got bloodied up. Then the nurse patched me up and got a call telling me that I had to take the bus, something happened and Malcolm couldn't pick me up for some reason don't know why." He told me and was just looking at me as he told it, not ashamed or afraid just truthful. This brought a smile to my face as I brought him into a hug again, and Alyssa joined in as well. He was being truthful and wasn't lying, and hell, he kicked two kids' asses when he was outnumbered, guess the lessons Malcolm and Alyssa taught him had finally paid off._

" _Why were they calling you gay?" Alyssa asked him as we separated again and began to walk towards the door. Reaching it, we stepped up the stairs but all three of us just sat down on the porch swing, enjoying the nice fall breeze. It was certainly nice and wasn't exactly cold or freezing either, just right. Christopher placed his bag on his lap, and began to unzip the front pouch digging through it to find something as he began to speak as well._

" _We had art class as the major elective today where we spent two hours in it. I think, maybe have been more not sure. But anyways we had to make like bracelets out of beads with letters on them. None of the guys were doing it and trying to act like it was to girly or whatever, but I wanted to actually make some and so I did and like all of the other girls did to as they went nuts over it. But as soon as the guys noticed I was actually doing it they were just pestering me all around the clock." He told us and finally found what he was looking for and pulled them out of the bag but hid them in his hand as he looked at us both, since he was sitting in between us. "Ok close your eyes both of you." He told us and was smiling as he said this. Raising a brow, both I and Alyssa gave each other a glance before shrugging and closing our eyes._

 _Feeling something go around my wrist, I wondered what it could be, then had a good guess but didn't say a word as a few seconds later, he stopped fidgeting with my wrist and figured that he was working on Alyssa's next. Few seconds later he tapped us both on the shoulder and we opened our eyes as we looked at our wrists. And there it was, a beaded bracelet with black and blue beads. But in the middle were white beads, with black letters inscribed in them, taking a closer look, I broke out into a smile and looked at him reading what they spelled out. "Best Sisters." Is what it said, on both mine and Alyssa's? We weren't even related but I guess with us being around him so much we took the role usually was just shrugging things off, but this was serious. He raised his hands and seemed to wipe them down his face slowly, before he just stared at the kitchen sinks window, almost like he was just numb and tired. Moving slightly, my jacket rustled making a noise and he turned to look at me startled, his eyes were red from something apparently and he quickly fixed his jacket sleeves to cover his wrist and arms._

Feeling something and a voice, I couldn't help but just ignore and continue to sleep and dream, I didn't want anything, to face what was going on. But I felt another shove this time rougher and the voice growling and louder. My dream shattered and now awake, I didn't remember where I was and the touch, wasn't familiar for waking up, my hand dipped down and grabbed my Beretta 92FS and pointed it, slamming it into the person's throat, growling and finally opening my eyes. Looking at the person, I faltered realizing it was just Malcolm waking me up, I must have fallen asleep inside of the pickup truck during the ride. My finger was hovering over the trigger and poised ready to pull the trigger and end him, but finally and shakily pulled away slowly as he tried to calm me down.

Slowly lowering the gun from his neck, taking several deep and shaky breathes, I holstered it back down to my thigh where the holster hung and clipped to my belt. Looking around, and seeing the dark grey storm clouds, I also noticed a sign right in front of us and swallowed as it was a touchy subject for me. There in bright white and bold letters were the words, **Military Recruiting Station.** Each branches symbol hung in the window, five of them from the Coast Guard to the Army, each of them. Looking back at Malcolm, I clenched my jaw at him and narrowed my eyes staring at him intently, having half a mind to grab the pistol again and punch him across the jaw with the pistol hilt, just pistol whip the hell out of him. But I remained calm and just continued to stare at him and give him the death stare.

"Why the hell are we at a recruiter's station? There will be no supplies or anything here, nothing important so please tell me why?" I growled at him and just stiffened in my seat sitting up. The rain was slowly beginning to fall and the clouds were only coming closer and thicker, which meant that a storm was coming for sure. Turning to stare and look at him again, he had a knowing look which meant he had a plan, and hating to admit it to him, his plans were usually smart and he was right.

"Because they do have supplies, just not the typical supplies. Shirts, blankets, jackets, water bottles, those supplies and things along those lines. But you know you being a smart ass and think you always know everything. Things that can keep us and stay warm as well, and who knows maybe there might be some uniforms and tactical gear as well." He responded back to me and had a smug look across his face now. Listening to him, all I did was just turn away and sigh, shaking my head and wanting to get it over with, sooner we left, the sooner we could go somewhere else.

"Let's just get it over with." I finally started and opened the door to his Ford Raptor and stepped out of the truck, feeling the slight drizzle beginning to dampen my hair. Shaking my head more, irritated, I just pulled the hood up on the army jacket I was wearing, and it was nice to, a leather jacket that was army, kind of like a leather sports jacket. Keeping the hood up over my head, I made sure my hair was off to the side on one shoulder. Hearing his door slam as well, we both did our usual routine which was a common weapons check. Knowing the pistol was already good to go because of just now nearly killing Malcolm by putting a bullet in his neck.

The next thing was the M960 Calico SMG, it was a personal thing with why I always kept it with me, not necessarily a tactical advantage, and it was my uncle's, closest thing to family and raised me I had. He was a huge gun nut, he taught me the ways of guns. Even gave me his old leather army fingerless gloves he had when he was in the service. Two most personal things I had with a couple others, the other things were more in my mind with everything he taught me. Knew how to make bombs, make weapons, even build rounds and ammo to keep the guns supplied, all I needed were a weapons bench and press.

The only weapon that I always checked majorly was the SCAR-H. It was the heavy rifle variant of the class. Shot the heavy caliber to that the Russian AK-47 shot. To me it was better than the M4 or 16 class because of the heavier variant and rounds it fired, but also it felt more like an assault rifle then the other weapons. With the holographic sight it was a good weapon for range as well, along with the laser attached onto the side with the flashlight. The standard for grip was comfortable as well, but I still needed an angled one like Malcolm, those were more comfortable. The only thing was that the magazine held 20 rounds, instead of 30 rounds. But it was good and steady just like I needed it to be, was reliable just like the people I trusted. Right now I was also wishing Roxanne was with us, she would sniff the troubles out before we even noticed it. Turning to look at Malcolm, I nodded my head towards the door of the facility, and walks towards it as well and pressed my back to the wall. Coming up to me, he began talking to me about what the plans were and all I did was nod and squeeze the grip once turning the light on, along with reaching over and activating the laser.

Tapping him on the shoulder, he quickly yanked the door open, quickly rushing through it, my rifle was raised as I peered through the holographic sight and just saw the top lights flickering from the ceiling, and one of them was dangling by a wire and just flickered even more erratically. Listening, I heard the door close and he tapped me on the shoulder again signaling that the rear was clear. Explaining how we would handle the situation, we began to make our ways down the hall checking the rooms.

The first one was the Coast Guard for me, the recruiter was slumped over his chair, his head having been knocked off his body and in the corner of his room, nothing else even remained as everything had been wrecked, like someone had gone through it, the stench of blood and decay nearly made me wretch but I kept my bile down and left the room The next room was the marine corps, both recruiters also there, but one had been in actual uniform, with his digitals and all, while the other was actually wearing his casual dress uniform with the blue pants that had the red stripe along with the short sleeve brown shirt. Looking around, I noticed a tactical combat vest on display and took note to make sure to come back for it but moved on from the room. Finally was the Navy office, the only one that had put up a fight it seems as three dead skitters were bunched up in the doorway scattered. Turning into the room, my flashlight came across an actual Navy SEAL, slumped against the wall with his chest cut open. His eyes were cold and numb, his head cocked to the side as if staring at his hand, following his gaze I looked at his hand and smiled softly seeing how he stood up.

In his hand was a stainless steel, nickel plated, M1911A1 pistol, two empty clips were at his feet, while the third was in the handgun and the slide was back as it was out of his ammo. Smiling weakly, I walked over to the man and crouched looking at him for a second before swallowing. Closing the man's eyes, I gently pulled the handgun from his fingers and tucked it into my jeans, before turning and saw something else shiny in the corner of the room. Walking over, it was a set of keys and realized it must have been the master set in case someone got locked out or something. Grabbing them, I noted the one that had the word Storage on it and kept it in my hand and made my way over to Malcolm who was done and waiting for me at the end of the hall, near the storage closet.

Showing the keys to him, he stepped to the side and extended a hand directing me to the door. "After you." He smirked at me like a smart aleck, giving a fake smile, I flipped him the bird before walking past him and chuckled reaching the door knob and slid the key into it, while he watched my back and had his gun pointed down the hall, if even the slightest sight of alien or hostility appeared, he would fill them with lead in a heartbeat, giving me a sense of security and relief. Unlocking the door, I took a step back and kicked the door in, rifle raised in case of an unexpected surprise and entered the room quickly looking around and noticing that the room was clear. A sigh of relief flooded across me, dropping my rifle and letting it hang, and I turned and called back to him.

"Rooms clear." I called and he walked in a second later and I just smirked at him as he looked like a typical scavenger. He had on a baseball cap, with a bandana around his neck, a jacket, fingerless gloves, some cargo pants and combat boots to top it off. He was an official badass, or said he liked to say which usually ended in everyone dying of laughter and him acting all butt hurt. But when he walked in he saw all of the supplies and turned to look at me with a smirk and I knew exactly what he was going to make me do and soon enough the words came out of his mouth. I groaned and walked over punching him across the arm

"Say it." He told me that made me punch him again harder this time and caused an effect as he rubbed his arm and it was most likely numb. But that's what he gets for being a smart ass like he was sometimes. But our bet was a bit like usual, it helped relieve the tension and gave us something to joke about no matter how stupid it was. But I couldn't help myself and neither could he, because if the situation would have been reversed, I would have been doing the exact same thing to him.

"You were right." I mutter and he just smirked and winked to me in return that had me laugh. But after that we began to pack all of the supplies from shirts, to blankets, and even notepads. His brother Christopher, loved to write, he was always writing in this composition notebook of his. Like a journal but he was writing a novel at the same time of our daily struggles, if this war ended, this apocalypse, and things were back to normal. That book was going to be published, it would be the survival guide of how we did survive, what it was like to be hunted daily and on the brink of survival, but we pushed on, we didn't think of it. Malcolm and I had finally packed a duffel bag each and walked to the truck, opening the back door and tossed them in the back seats, before turning and heading back inside as there was still more to grab. This time, I looked around more and walked back to the Marine Corps office to grab the tactical vest and put it on, sliding several magazines into the pouches so they were easy to access.

Walking back to the storage. Malcolm had already packed another duffel bag and was heading back to the truck to drop it off. Walking past him, I noticed there was probably about two more duffel bags worth of supplies, so instead of packing just one, I worked on both of the duffel bags and had stuffed them full of the rest of the supplies. The only thing left was a long sleeve Army shirt that I couldn't get to fit into the bag for the life of me. So figuring not wanting it to go to waste. I slid off the vest over my head along with my jacket and placed them on the ground, along with my rifle. Grabbing the shirt, I began to slide the shirt on when I heard a sharp crack that sounded like a gunshot, and nearly reached for my rifle but then rationalized that Malcolm would have warned me by now, and two it was most likely a thunderclap. So shaking my head, I slid the shirt on fully and tucked the excess into my jeans and tightened the belt slightly before sliding my jacket back over, and then the jacket, finally sliding the sling of my rifle over my shoulder.

Both duffel bags packed and ready to go, I looked out the door to see if Malcolm was coming, but instead of seeing him, I saw someone else beginning to walk down the hall, along with several other figures outside around the truck, all smirking and laughing and my blood ran cold, maybe it was a gunshot I heard earlier, maybe Malcolm was actually dead. Ducking behind the wall, I tried to process what to do, tons of scenarios were going through my head, but I knew I didn't have much longer until the man was on me. Letting my rifle drop, I grabbed my combat knife from my boot and stood up waiting for the man to appear. It didn't take long as I heard his footsteps finally and were getting louder and louder with every step, his light from his gun was seen through the doorway and I had only a few seconds left. Taking a deep breath, I began to slow my breathing and knew I would only have one shot at this.

Slowly the man's rifle barrel began to enter the doorway and into the room I was in. Waiting for it to enter about halfway, and seeing one of his hands under the barrel, I sprang into action, grabbing the barrel and yanking him into the room. My other hand slammed the knife into his throat without a second thought, my worry for Malcolm and rage fueling me to end the man's life as his eyes shot open and looked shocked before he fell to the ground, his body spasming and twitching as he bled out. Dragging the body away from the doorway, I tucked him into the corner before looking him over, seeing what he was carrying and what type of weaponry he had on him. It wasn't much but he had a World War II, M1 carbine as his primary weapon, with a Sig Sauer P226 pistol tucked into the front of his jeans. Looking at him, I knew he wouldn't be shooting or killing anyone anymore, but just to be sure, I relieved him of his weapons and also his explosives and tucked them into the other corner of the room.

Peeking around the corner again, most of them men had gone to the other side of the truck and were staring down at what looked like the tire. Finally one of them moved and I gasped before quickly placing a hand over my mouth. There Malcolm was, holding his leg from a gunshot wound as a man stood over him. Looking at the group of men and realizing all had their backs to me, a small smile tugged at my lips as maybe I could still save Malcolm. So quickly moving, I crept down the hall and rushed to the wall next to the entrance and slammed my back against it. Feeling the adrenaline rush through me it felt absolutely amazing, it was like an addiction feeling the fight or flight fluid run through my veins. Peering around the corner again, I managed to catch it just in time to see who I was guessing the boss man was, shoot one of his men in the head before turning to look back at Malcolm and raise his large handgun at his head.

It was now or never to rescue him, slowly raising my rifle and peering through the optic, I somehow felt different about to pull the trigger, like it wasn't the same as plunging a blade into someone, it wasn't up close and personal, it was distant. But seeing him about to murder one of my best friends, it made slightly easier as my finger gently pressed against the trigger, before pulling it slowly and the rifle barked in response, the bullet flying true and clear entering the man's back, and exiting through the man's chest right where his heart would be. The rain was still coming down, but I could see the red mist of blood spray and coat Malcolm's face partially. The men were shocked and began to look around before one spotted me and yelled, pointing his finger at me and raised his rifle sending a burst my way, as I ducked behind the wall and saw the brick explode into chunks and dust.

 **Malcolm's POV**

The next thing I knew after the gunshot, was feeling the warm spray of blood splatter across my face, but I wasn't the only one shocked, everyone was slack jawed and staring at the man as he staggered before beginning to fall, his hand loosening his grip on the Deagle and it fell out of his grip as well. Looking around slowly, I saw Kaylee at the entrance, her SCAR-H smoking at the barrel that showed she was the one who fired. But I wasn't the only one who noticed as one of the men spotted her and pointed in her direction, before raising his rifle and fired a long burst in her direction, as she managed to duck behind the brick wall for cover and safety. Seeing this, and knowing she wouldn't be able to do this all on her own, I saw the Deagle fall straight into my hand perfectly. The recoil on this monster was huge and would most likely break my wrist. But using my dominant hand, while the other held my wound and finally managed to slow the bleeding, I pointed at the nearest man and pulled the trigger. The guns recoil bucked and nearly did break my wrist shooting pain through my arm, but I managed to control it and moved to the next man and fired again, and I kept doing that until the last round was fired at the man who shot Kaylee and the slide clicked and locked back as the magazine was empty and only two men were left. Both turned and were about to fill me with lead, when Kaylee acted first and used my distraction to her advantage popping back out and switched to full auto, filling both of them with the rest of her bullets as they both did a dance of death with each round entering them before they fell to the ground dead.

For a few seconds the only thing that was heard was the sound of rain falling, and the occasional thunderclap, smoke from the gun barrels could be seen, as the rain cooled the barrels down from recently being fired. But then Kaylee ran over to me and opened the truck door, reaching into the glove compartment and pulled out a white case with a red cross across it. Slamming the door shut, she dropped to her knees, not caring for the dirt and opened the case immediately digging through it. She pulled out some Morphine, a pack of Sulfa Powder to fight the risk of infection, and then a bandage. Quickly she injected my leg with the syringe for morphine, then ripped the packet open pouring the powder over and into my wound, and finally lifted my leg and wrapped it tightly with the bandage. Once it was done, she looked at me and hugged me tightly for a second before slapping me.

"You scared the shit out of me, you should have warned me somehow earlier damnit." She growled to me before just looking away then back at me obviously pissed off at me. I didn't how to respond to her at all so I didn't, I just stared at her silently before swallowing and slowly moved my leg. It hurt, but I wouldn't be able to stay off of it. Looking at her, she slowly stood up as her hood had fallen off and her hair was soaked and damped now, clinging to her neck and skin.

"Help me up?" I asked her curiously and raised an eyebrow at her. She looked down at me before slowly she nodded and sighed as she extended her hand down to me, using my opposite hand, I gripped hers slightly and counted to three silently before she pulled me up onto both of my legs and supported me so my weight wasn't fully on the injured leg. "HOLY FUCK!" I shouted though as it hurt badly and I nearly blacked out from the pain. Standing there, I slowly moved the injured leg though and finally the pain was slowly ebbing away, until it was just a throbbing sensation, with a spike of pain shooting through me with a minor movement of the wrong way, but the important thing was that I was still mobile and could move, just slowly. Turning to look at her, I nodded to the bodies for a second before beginning to speak. "Let's police these bodies, grab all the weapons, ammo, supplies, and gear, leave nothing that we could possible use." I told her and she nodded slowly as she let me go. Testing my weight without her, I could still move, so slowly making my way around, I began to check each body and grabbed the weapons, and whatever else was useful off of them. All of the weapons were random and from different time periods, from old western repeating rifles, to the ACR on the boss man.

Grabbing each of them, we just tossed the weapons in the back on the floor board, not even caring as finally when we were done, she brought out two finally duffel bags from the Recruiting Station and tossed them in the back as well. All in all we had nine two handed weapons, and 12 sidearm from the group of men that had tried to kill and steal from us. I got my Glock and M16 back as well thankfully but the rifle was in the back as I had a weapon slung that caught my eye. It was a Marlin Model 1895 SBL lever action rifle, with a two piece black and grey laminated wood furnishing. The rifle shot the powerful 45-70 Govt. round, holding six rounds in the tube underneath the barrel. But the rifle was also modified, on its stock was a ammo holder for six rounds, a rail on top of the stainless steel finish where the chamber and lever action was, and had a sling that also had a round holder with three columns across, and four down able to hold 12 more rounds as all the holders were filled with the bullets.

I had always wanted one of the rifles, but my father said they were too much hassle and he preferred to have his Marlin 336 that shot a 30-06 round instead. But now I had the rifle from my dreams, and all it coasted was the apocalypse, and for us to kill several men or we would have been killed. Looking at the rifle it was just absolutely beautiful in my opinion and I felt like a kid having got the best present on Christmas morning. Finally slinging it across my chest and shoulder, I shifted slightly on my legs as a small discomfort of pain was forming and I looked around before seeing a gun pawn shop only a couple stores downs. Turning to Kaylee, I pointed in its direction and began to walk towards it. I was going to have to get use to the discomfort, as I had one more stop anyways to go to anyways and scavenge at after this, so might as well embrace the pain as much as I could. So while I was walking, she hopped inside of the truck and began to drive to the store as well and arrived when I did.

Reaching the building, I didn't wait for her and reached for the doors handle as it had a caged gate in front of it, tugging on the handle the heavy metal door opened and I stepped inside slowly shining the flashlight around and scanned the small business area. Seeing several sleeping bags, I put two and two together as it dawned on me that this was the hideout of the group of men that attacked me. Most of the gear and equipment was military issue as well, and for some reason I had a feeling they owned most of the stuff before the attack, most likely they were a bunch of mercenaries and when the attack happened they must have ran into each other and just decided to work with each other and prey on the weak. But the only problem was that there were no more weapons around, or none I could see anyways, almost like what they had on them was all they had. But what I did see was enough ammo to last for a while. Boxes upon boxes of ammo were lined across the shelves still, walking over to the glass counter and peering inside, were several optics and modifications for weapons. It was the jackpot we needed to keep us supplied tactically.

All of a sudden a loud crash was heard from the back room, my right hand dropping to my hip and pulled the Glock out, also activating the flashlight underneath it as well. Putting the arm that was holding the flashlight underneath the Glock, I put Glock over it and used it as a support of sorts and slowly began to walk to the back of the store and crept nervously to the back of the room, my leg limping slightly. The room's door was slightly opened, hearing nothing, I pushed it open gently and out came scurrying several small rats that nearly made me jump and scared the ever living piss out of me. "Fucking rats, go visit a pirate ship." I muttered sarcastically before walking into the back of the back room and saw a mini fridge that had a padlock across it. Raising an eyebrow I was about to enter the room when Kaylee walked in and came over, standing next to me.

"Staring getting this loaded, I'm going to see what's inside of that fridge then we're going to get going to that gas station. Cover the truck bed with the tarp so when we get to the gas station, it will already be out and we won't have to worry about pulling it out." I told her and she didn't seem happy that I was ordering her around still with my injured leg, but she nodded reluctantly and began to go pack up the ammo and the weapon attachments. Watching her for a second my mind wandered, but then I snapped out of it and walked over to the fridge, aiming my Glock at the lock and shot it off before holstering it and turned the tactical light off underneath it. Taking my time and biting my lip. I agonizingly slowly, went into a painful crouch and opened the fridge, for a second all I could see was fog from all of the cold air and condensation that had been trapped inside of it, but then it cleared up and three cylinders were visible and I smirked even more. Grabbing them. I shot up and ignored the pain hobbling over to Kaylee who was exiting the store.

"Merry Christmas." I told her and showed her the cylinders. She looked at them as well and I swore she was about to squeal as her eyes were like sausages, almost made me think she was going to start salivating over them. But she also looked at me questioningly like I was yanking her chain but I clarified for her just for the sake of it. "Yes Kaylee these three are honest to God suppressors." And with that she grabbed them and held them close to her like Smegal off of Lord of the Rings, any second she would probably be muttering they were her precious. "C'mon, let's go, one more stop then we can go home and I can get off of this leg and let it rest and heal properly." She nodded and was still grinning as she tossed the last duffel bag we had into the back and filled the remaining space up with it that was full of the ammunition and attachments we found. Hopping into the passenger seat and pulling myself into it, I grabbed the suppressors from her and placed them into the glove compartment before closing it, and my door then buckling myself up.

She quickly hopped into the driver's seat and turned the key starting the vehicle back up and the engine roared to life as she revved the engine, while putting the seatbelt on. Since I now had the injured leg, she would be driving the rest of the trip and back home, to where I would probably be bombarded with questions and an overprotective younger brother trying to take care of me. Soon the vehicle lurched and she sped away from the small town strip mall. Looking at the rearview mirror, the bodies of the men motionless in the mud soon disappeared from the reflection but all I could think about was what had happened over and over in my head, and was glad that it had happened to me and not Kaylee.

Looking out of the window, I noticed and watched the scenery as we drove through the rest of the small town, then we reached the highway and continued on driving down. About five miles out and off in what was like the middle of nowhere near the capitol Boston, was a gas station, barely anyone except the small town knew about it, but at the same time it got enough business to keep it open and functional. Looking at the woods, sometimes I wished I had taken us and just moved to the woods in a cabin or something. But we fought and stayed where we were, having gathered a ton of supplies and equipment, if we were to leave to somewhere else, it would take several trips unless we got a bigger truck to transport it all, but I just figured we wouldn't be leaving any time soon.

Ahead of us was an overpass of the highway and an ambulance was hanging off the side of it, the back of it was, and the doors were open. Looking up at it, I figured some supplies were in it, but it wasn't worth the risk of digging through it when it had the chance of collapsing, so I just kept to myself and stared onwards as we drove underneath it and the sign of the gas station was visible finally. Shifting my rifle slightly, she just continued to drive and push towards the gas station. Since the invasion there were no laws, and I was the oldest out of all of us, I made sure that I, Alyssa, and Kaylee knew how to drive the truck, and also ride the dirt bikes and ATV. Christopher was too small to drive the truck but he could handle the off road vehicles as well just fine so he had a way to escape.

Kaylee slowed down and parked next to a pump as if she was going to just fuel up like a normal day. Looking around, the trees were swinging as the storm seemed to have followed us and the rain was beginning to fall again, both of us having our clothes soaked to the bone. Yet I was warm as the adrenaline was still rushing through me, guess getting shot and nearly dying doesn't just go away, it sticks with you. Looking around, I noticed a garage next to the gas station as well and the whole place seemed to still be in one place. Kaylee turned to look at me and she had an expression across her face that had me look at her weird as well.

"I just now realized, most of the vehicles quit working because of the EMP blast, how is this truck working?" She asked me and raised an eyebrow as she patted the steering wheel for emphasis.

"My Dad was you know Army, well with all of the fear of China, Russia, or some other country retaliating whether it be a nuclear attack, or a EMP, he wanted to be ready so he replaced all of the electronic components and just put in non-electrical replacements so the truck could still run, partially why the truck doesn't produce much heat as well as its quieter. But also with this town so far away from all of the major cities, none of it seemed to affect us here it seems, so all of the vehicles and power is running." I pointed out to her and smiled slightly to her as I was glad, because I think I would have gone insane along with them if we didn't have the MP3 players loaded with music, each of us having one, loaded with our preferences of music.

"Do you think for those that survived are able to get power back up and running along with replacing some of the electrical components?" She asked me curiously as well that stopped me and had me think of it for a moment. I wanted to say yes, because it was possible, but at the same time, I honestly didn't know if people could or were doing it, hell I didn't even know if enough people were around and alive to be able to do something like that, but all in all I hoped that people could and actually were doing that, maybe even somehow having set up a safe haven.

"I want to say yes, because I hope that people are actually doing it." I told her and smiled nodding and that seemed to get her to smile to me as well and nod her head. With that, she turned the truck off and opened her door to step out as I did the same but slower. Putting my uninjured leg and foot to the ground first, I lowered my injured one of the small step and stepped onto the ground getting use to the weight on it before moving and closed the door behind me. The lever action rifle hung across my right shoulder as the barrel pointed straight into the air. Looking around I didn't know whether to investigate the garage or the actual station first. Reaching into my pocket, I felt the familiar sensation of a good old fashioned quarter, I always kept one on me so in case of a dilemma or a choice, I just flipped the coin to decide. "Heads the garage, tails the store." I told Kaylee as she walked around the truck and stopped in front of me. She nodded and with that, I flicked my thumb and the coin flew into the air before, extending my palm and caught the coin before flipping it and slapped it to my opposite arm and slowly raised the hand to reveal the heads side of the coin.

"Garage it is then, let's get going." She told me cheerfully as she began to walk towards the garage. Nodding my head and glaring at her, I felt like she was enjoying the fact that I was injured as she could tease me all she wanted, and I wouldn't be able to retaliate to her without most likely hurting myself. Following after her, I brought my right arm up and moved my jacket up my arm slightly to see my watch and the time. According to the watch it was 5:45 P.M, we nearly had been out for a full 12 hours. Groaning, I wanted to go home and go to sleep and just sleep for at least a minimum of 24 hours. But this had to be done, then depending on how well it worked out, we could stay for a while. Finally we reached the garage and surprisingly there was no lock on it, so without even asking her to, Kaylee crouched and gripped the handle bar for the sliding door then yanked up and it opened up.

The smell of must was strong as I tried to turn away, and soon the smell was airing out as I looked back to see the distinct color of red with containers and cans that were used to hold Gasoline. Walking over to them, we each began shaking and testing them and sure enough they were full of the liquid gold for our vehicle, even a couple of them were full of Diesel. Turning to look at her we knew we hit the jackpot.

"Let's load up, take everything, this place was far off not many people knew about, let's not leave any for anyone else that happens to stumble across it, especially if they are bad people. Don't want to run into another group like those guys that got the drop on me at the recruiting station." I explained to her and she nodded slowly. Walking in, she grabbed a dolly to start loading the Drums full of the Gasoline and Diesel, while I walked over and began grabbing the small red containers, managing to hold two in each hand without causing even more pain and limped my way back to the truck and placed them in the truck bed, we each had to take about three trips to carry all of it and when we were done loading it all, about two thirds of the truck bed was full with it and there was enough space to load some other things into the back.

Panting for a second as I was starting to work up a sweat, I raised an arm and ran it across my forehead wiping the sweat from my brow and also smearing it with mud from my sleeve. This of course brought a small chuckle and smile from Kaylee as she came over and wiped a finger across the mud a couple of times and made a smiley face from the smudge of mud across my forehead. I growled and bared my teeth imitating biting her a couple of times as my teeth clacked together. She acted afraid and just poked my cheek, receiving an annoyed look from me in return.

"Let's go, we check the station and get out of here." I told her and she nodded as we both turned and slowly began to walk to the entrance of the station. The storm was finally over us, and looking up the dark grey clouds extended as far as the eye could see in every direction, but it also had slight gaps that let some light pass so it just seemed like a grey day but enough that everything was still visible clearly. Looking back at the entrance, both of the glass doors had been shattered as thousands of tiny pieces littered the entrance tiled floor of the station. But then something caught my attention as on the glass it wasn't the clear and sparkling glass, but most of it was covered and stained in dark crimson, but also what troubled me was that it wasn't just on the glass, it formed into a blood trail and led past several aisles before turning and rounding a corner behind the cashiers counter.

Kaylee and I both looked at each other concerned before we began to enter the station, the lights flickering like at the recruiting station but the blood trail had the hairs on the back of my neck sticking up and my breath seemed to be quickening, my heart pounding against my chest and I swore that Kaylee could hear it. Soon the glass underneath our boots began to crackle and break even more as the boots applied pressure to it and they just didn't have the strength for it, I was even applying full pressure to the wounded leg, but the nerves had taken over and the pain receptors weren't really transmitting anything as the uneasy feeling of something watching us seemed to follow. Finally we reached the corner and rounded it to see what it led to. Two bodies were slouched over, side by side hiding behind the counter, one had two bullets to her chest and another in her head, while the man next to her just had a single one to the head. But the rounds were very large and almost precise.

"Mech bullets, my guess, the girl got hit in the chest a couple of times, and the guy dragged her behind here. She was losing too much blood, so he ended her suffering, and then he ended himself." Kaylee whispered and sure enough a small revolver was in the young man's hand as it was still angled and pointed at his head. The thought made me sad and think for a moment as that could have been anyone of us at any time if we had been caught at the wrong place at the wrong time. "Let's just leave the bodies alone, and scavenge the place." She told me and I agreed nodding with her as we both turned and walked around checking each aisle. The shelves and coolers were picked clean, nothing was visible. I was about to give up when I saw the back door was closed shut. Walking over to it, I yanked it open and smiled as my gut had been right.

"Jackpot!" I shouted as boxes of canned foods, and nonperishable items such as granola bars and other foods were shown. But also several packs of water bottles, teas, and even Gatorades were shown. We were saved at least for a couple months, to be honest I wasn't even sure this day was going to be a good one I had dreaded it with doubt. Minus the gunshot wound and now swollen eye from the severe beating along with a small cut across my head. But it was soon short lived as we went to also placing those in the truck and soon enough it was loaded as much as it could be and we had everything we could, but while Kaylee grabbed the trap to tie it off and cover it all, also to help prevent anything from falling out and keeping it tightened down, I grabbed a gas canister and really didn't care if it was a waste or not, I had to do this for me personally.

Walking back into the station, I quickly unscrewed the lid and began to pour Gasoline around the counter and then just walked around the station pouring it over everything and anything coating the entire place as evenly as I could with the flammable liquid. But slowly the flow of Gasoline began to lessen and shrink in its flow and size coming out until it was a drizzle then stopped as I reached the entrance of it. Turning to Kaylee she was done prepping the truck for the final drive back and walked over to me as she seemed to be understanding what I was doing. Walking a few steps back, I reached into my pocket and pulled out a simple Zippo lighter and lit the small flame, staring at it for a second before turning to the station. "Rest in Peace." I whispered softly before tossing the lighter into the gas station and in an instant the flame spread across the entire station and it began to erupt into a bright fireball burning as we felt the heat a few feet away.

"Let's get out of here, before they catch on and send something to check it out." She whispered along with me nodding and we went back to the truck, climbed in and she sped away like a bat out of hell. The whole time I stared out the rear view mirror and just watched the fire consume the area and it went into a bigger fireball as the pumps with whatever remaining gas blew as well and would attract a bigger attention than we originally thought. Finally the storm was getting worst and even darker and I knew this was the main part of the storm, thunder clapping louder and more regularly as lightning flashed more regularly as well in all directions. But in about 20 minutes, we would reach home and everything could be back to normal for a while turning to look at Kaylee I began to talk to her.

"Anything you see that you want?" I asked her and chuckled grinning at her, me and her were the gun nuts and weapons expert of the four of us. Me and her each had a small arsenal of weapons that we personally owned, Alyssa was a ok shot, but she preferred close quarters, hand to hand combat, but the best weapons she was best at using was a pistol because she had a knife underneath so that was her best shot for a weapon, using anything else, she was ok with not the best or worst just a basic shot. Christopher was slightly better at handling weapons, but also he was Alyssa combined, he could sneak and deliver a series of blows and knock the person out or dead. He was our stealth operator I guess you could say, I was still learning from him to sneak around as silently as he did.

"I want the ACR for one, since I have pretty much one of everything else for main combat rifles, and maybe the Deagle actually if you don't mind, even though it did nearly kill you, execution style." She chuckled the last part and smiled grinning. She punched my arm playfully and just smiled grinning even more at me as this truck was currently like a candy store for her.

"Ok just for shits and giggles, tell me all of the weapons you own that you brought with you, that you and your uncle built and owned, and then the ones that I gave to you." I told her and chuckled smiling and grinning at her, wanting to know exactly all of the firepower she owned personally.

"You are evil but sure why not I can play along. That I had brought with me from my uncle were two Heckler and Koch G36K assault rifles, two AK-47s, Beretta 92FS handgun, M40A5 sniper rifle, Calico M960 SMG, Colt Anaconda .44 revolver, PP-2000 SMG, QCW-05 my uncle got that from being stationed in Japan, HK MSG 90 rifle, HK93 rifle, .22 rifle, Colt M4A1 carbine, and a M14. From you I got the M16A4, the SCAR-H, FN Five Seven pistol, and the P90 SMG. What about you, I know you owned a few weapons, what did you own before, and after we opened the bunkers armory.

"So not fair but sure I'll play since you did. Before everything with what my dad gave me, since I'm more of a World War II and Wild Western buff like he was, he gave me some of the weapons in his collection that use to hang in his study back at the house, which I still haven't walked into because I'm afraid to see what's in there. But I had a M1917 Trench Gun, Colt M1921AC Thompson SMG with the fire control selector, compensator, and the wooden fore grip, a Colt Single Action Army revolver, Winchester Model 1887 lever action shotgun, Three M1911As a Rock Island Armory with nickel plated and a pearl grip, a regular with the brown grip and regular plating, and a custom one my father got when he retired that has his name inscribed in the black plating, with also pearl hand grips as it is a beautiful piece. After the armory is my own M16A4, two M4A1s one a SOPMOD variant, while the other just regular that I always seem to change out, SCAR-H, AA-12 shotgun, the Glock 17, and the SRS sniper rifle that shoots the .338 Lapua rounds." I told her as well and her armory clearly beat mine, but that wasn't including the explosives such as grenades we had and that were left over in the armory and she seemed to be thinking the same thing.

"That leaves the four AT4 rocket launcher, M32 grenade launcher, standalone M203 grenade launcher, M1014 Shotgun, M60A4 LMG, and the M240B LMG, M249 SAW, Barrett M82A1 .50 BMG, five USPs, 10 Glocks, and 10 extra M4A1s just ready to be used and that's what we just leave alone and haven't even bothered using. Why do you think your father had that many weapons and firepower, not that I'm complaining, but why do you think he went that far? Christopher uses the HK MP5A5 with the far end weapon light installed into it, a holographic sight, and the synthetic furniture fixed stock, along with the Beretta M9A1 and the mounted flashlight underneath it. Alyssa has just the Glock we gave her like yours with the under mounted tactical flashlight. She also got the other M4A1 from the armory, the react torch grip on it, the regular thirty round magazines, red dot, and collapsible stock. Just a basic load out for her, while Christopher loves his weapons just fine cleaning them regularly, but you heard Alyssa, she doesn't want more than two weapons to much hassle for her." Kaylee finished the weapon load out as well for what we rarely used or that the other two used when they were out.

"What about the other gear and equipment we have? And as for the firepower, he wasn't thinking of an alien invasion, he was expecting Russia or China to be dropping from the skies, so I'm just glad he prepared all of this, because this is much worst." I asked her and told her curiously just wanting to keep the conversation going, I didn't want the trip to be silent, where my thoughts could be plunged into the darkness and everything that had happened would swarm me again, and just have me depressed and second guessing myself.

"For the 40mm grenade launchers, we have the regular high explosive, smoke, and flare rounds but your father also did some mad scientist tinkering having incendiary rounds, acid rounds that explode and send it everywhere, flash bang rounds that explode on impact, white phosphorus rounds and nitrogen rounds as well that freeze some just with the touch of it when it explodes. C-4, and the Napalm C-4. Fragmentation grenades, smoke grenades, flash bangs, and semtex. Night vision goggles, binoculars, tactical binoculars, range finders, suppressors and a bunch of other stuff along with the plenty of boxes of MREs, military grade issue sleeping bags, ponchos, and cots. Pretty much everything we did need for an apocalypse but haven't touched as well until we need it. Which the walls were lined with a heavy amount of copper that cancelled the EMP blast and protected everything inside of the bunker that was under the shed. Also what we have used are the weapons press and shell molding to make our own bullets when we find what we need to make our own. How we have been making the new Mech buster bullets, by melting the Mech metal and putting them into the press, we even have bullets for the pistols at last resort." She informed and some of the things I knew, while others I forgot and didn't know we had.

"Oh the AK 47 we did just get, I'm going to keep, I'm going to tear out all of the wooden furniture for it and replace it with the rubber synthetic furniture that's more comfortable and ergonomic. Then give it to Alyssa, she seemed to have actually done better with the AK when we let her shoot it, just forgot to give it to her is all, and plus when she hits something, she has more hitting power when she hits someone." I told her and pointed out as she turned into the neighborhood where the house was. Soon the house came into view and she turned the truck into the driveway and open garage door, soon as she parked the truck was off and she hopped out of the truck and went to the garage door, jumping up and grabbed the handle and slammed it down shut tightly before locking it. Looking at the door to that led to the house, it didn't even take a minute as it flung open and two more bodies flooded into the room, an energetic and hyper 12 year old, and then a figure with shoulder length blonde hair and that was nearly five foot even came as well, but she seemed more irritated than anything.

 **Alyssa's POV**

Alyssa wake up, Alyssa wake up, Bitch wake up god damnit you don't need beauty sleep!"  
Someone was shaking me awake and with that shout it got my attention. Slowly opening my eyes, I saw Kaylee standing over me with a smug look across her face, if I hadn't been as groggy and as upset as I was, I would have had a witty comeback and decked her across her arm or something, but I just yawned and slightly sat up looking at her, figuring she was just waking me up for something. "Me and Malcolm are heading out early, should be back before it gets dark." She told me, yawning I nodded and slowly let my feet dangle off the bed before standing up and beginning to walk with her to lock the door and make sure everything was still ready to go. Following her, I ducked into Christopher's room to make sure he was still asleep still which he was.

As I ducked into the room, a head perked up and two eyes began to stare at me as a small whine was heard, and a couple soft thumps responded as well. Roxanne the German shepherd, was curled up and guarding Christopher as his personal guard dog, she always seemed to switch rooms every night, either in Kaylee's and my self's room, Malcolm's or Christopher's room. But every other night she was always in Christopher's room, guess she liked the kid the most out of us all, which I didn't blame as Christopher was the youngest and most innocent out of us all. Christopher was curled up across his bed, his Star Wars blanket wrapped around him tightly as the glow in the dark planets on his ceiling cast a slight glow in his room. But then I frowned slightly as I saw his holster hanging just above his head with his pistol in it just within arm's reach, and his MP5 leaning against the wall right next to his bed, his throwing knives on the windowsill right above where his head was on his pillow. Everything within arm's reach in case someone were to either break into the room or just attack the house, something that no kid should have to prepare for or do every night they go to bed, but of course the world wasn't safe anymore either.

Sighing to myself, I walked back out and made sure the door was cracked so I could listen for him, then continued following Kaylee down the hall, then down the stairs and spilling into the living room. The couch and two recliners against the walls away from the door, while a table was in the middle of the room with papers, maps, documents, and even a couple empty cans of Monster on it. The maps were marked with all sorts of symbols each representing certain things but mostly either to where we searched or major concentration of alien forces. Unfortunately the police station and National Guard depot had been picked clean and destroyed when we arrived to search them, both obvious places to check so we weren't that surprised when we found them in the current states, but still were slightly upset knowing we wouldn't be able to use what had been there. For some reason the town we were in, was surrounded by hills, so when the EMP hit, the hills kind of acted like a shield and disruption throwing the EMP off and mostly everything was still working, vehicles, electronics, even power and plumbing all were working thankfully.

Looking around, I spotted Malcolm shuffle out of the kitchen holding a coffee mug that was slightly steaming. He looked towards me and chuckled before he finished whatever warm drink he was drinking and placed it on a ledge before walking over to the couch where a bunch of weapons were. "Good Morning Sleeping Beauty." He told me and smirked as I growled and yanked my arm back and socked him as hard as I could and his arm like flew back before falling to his side limp. "SON OF A BITCH!" He yelled whispered so he didn't wake Christopher and held his arm as it must have gone to sleep and was most likely going to be leaving a bruise for the rest of the day forming and then be even more painful when his nerves woke back up and he was beginning to move it. I just grinned and winked at him innocently before going back to the glare and groggy look wanting to go back to sleep.

He and Kaylee walked over to the couch and began to grab the weapons they had laid out for the scavenging this morning, while they began to gear up, I also looked over what they were wearing. Malcolm was wearing his black, steel toed combat boots, black cargo, tactical trousers, a simple black Under Armor shirt, with his leather jacket over it, both hands covered with his fingerless gloves and his watch on his right wrist, a set of dog tags dangling from his neck that had his name on one and Christopher's on the other, Christopher having the other pair, and on his head was a simple black baseball cap he wore. Reaching down he grabbed his combat knife and tucked it into his boot sheath, and grabbed a pocket knife sliding it into his right buttocks pant pocket. Grabbing his Glock 17, he tested the light real fast before tucking the handgun into his hip holster, and then reached over and grabbed his M16A4 assault rifle, placing the sling across his shoulder and chest letting it dangle before grabbing a couple of magazines and placing them in each cargo pocket, along with one on the inside breast pocket of his leather jacket before turning and looking over at Kaylee.

She was wearing something similar as both really liked the color black. She wore a pair of high tops, black skinny jeans, a black tank top that Malcolm didn't approve us wearing since they didn't keep us warm much when we were out scavenging, her own leather jacket, her Uncle's leather fingerless gloves, and a pair of aviators. She quickly grabbed her Beretta 92FS and checked the magazine before slamming it back into the handgun and pulled the chamber back and racked a bullet into it then tucked it into the thigh holster that wrapped around her upper thigh and clicked to her belt. Malcolm's father had been heavy military, Army ranger, special forces so he was use to using high speed tier one operator equipment so apparently he had bought a lot of gear and equipment storing it in the underground bunker, that was underneath the shed in case of something were to happen, it was also nuclear hardened. Kaylee also grabbed a large knife putting it into her boot as well, grabbing a pocket knife and put it into her right front pant pocket, while grabbing a Swiss army knife and putting it in a zip up pocket on her leather jacket. Then she grabbed her mandatory and always go to weapon the M960 Calico SMG and slung it across her back, wherever she went that was the weapon she always had on her, and finally she grabbed the heavier and more powerful SCAR-H assault rifle and slung it across her body as well and let it dangle by her hip.

Both ready to go scavenging now and patrolling, they reminded me of a game called Fallout where the main character had to scavenge everywhere for better weapons, supplies, and ammo. But the only difference was that they looked way cooler and prepared for what they were about to do. Malcolm waved me over and walked to the table, with Kaylee on the opposite side of him as well and he showed the map that he was using and began to explain what they were going to be doing today, tracing his finger across the route they would take.

"I just plan on going to a couple of places, hopefully for supplies. There's a sporting goods store across town, another one on the other side, a western store here, just a clothing store here. Once those are searched and we get whatever we can get, we'll most likely come back here and drop off what we have if we have anything. Then after that we'll refuel and head out again going to the center of town where the strip mall is, and after that is where we'll head about five miles out of town to that small gas station along the highway. Hopefully since it wasn't that big and it's kind of out of the way, it will have some food and drinks, maybe some other supplies we can use. We are well stocked as it is, but it's always best to be overstocked and scavenge a place for supplies, then wait and when we need them the stores are already picked over." He explained to us as we both nodded in consent, he was right after all. We were still stocked and good to go with everything that had been inside of the bunker and pantry, but not even a week later after the initial attack and invasion, he had been going out and scavenging, then after a couple of months he deemed it was safe and either myself or Kaylee tagged along with him to help, he never took Christopher with him alone because of his age, only Christopher came when it was all four of us going out together. But usually when he was left alone with either myself or Kaylee we would take him out and have him scavenge the houses in the neighborhood or take him out to one of the nearby houses to have him practice his shooting. Or when I was here, we would move everything in the living room and I and he would spar and train more advanced in hand to hand combat.

"No radios this time either Alyssa, we just want to remain safe and secure. We've never even planned or risked a big trip like this before, and we don't want anyone finding out what we have here, incase anything is to go bad with me and Malcolm. So if we are not back in about two to three days top. Assume the worst unfortunately and go to the bunker and stay there for nights, and during the day only do close by scavenging. Remember we have supply caches in some of the nearby houses so not everything is in one area in case anything is to happen to this house. That way you'll still be safe and secure, the only thing you'll need to do is find a new set of wheels for transportation as the bikes and ATV won't be much use for trying to transport huge amounts of supplies." Kaylee chipped in as well and informed me of the risks and other parameters that Malcolm hadn't filled me in on.

"Guess that means no more sleep for me." I chuckled and joked but nodded seriously as I needed to go and finish getting dressed. I usually just slept in a pair of sweatpants and a big shirt that Malcolm had each given us, we had been here, at his house during the invasion when it started. Granted we went back to my house to grab some clothes for me and Kaylee since she had been living with me, along with some personal belongings of mine and hers, But we still didn't much so he just let us borrow some of his clothes to either sleep in or just use for whatever we needed. The main thing he had was plaid and flannel shirts, and I would never admit this to him but those things were damn warm to wear and comfortable to.

Walking around the table, I hugged Kaylee tightly for a second. Kaylee was my best friend even above Malcolm even though he was super close almost tied with her, but just I and she had gone through some things that he just couldn't beat. If she were to die, I would be completely destroyed, don't get me wrong if Malcolm or Christopher got hurt I would be devastated as well, but with her it was just a bit more personal. Finally I let her go and just nodded smiling to her as we did our signature fist bump as well before turning and walking over to Malcolm.

I gave him a hug as well but he made it quick before pulling away slightly to look at me. "Take care of Christopher for me, if anything happens." He told me and I nodded my head. It was the same talk every time he went out with one of us, if he were to die, we were the ones to take care of Christopher, make sure he survived, to make sure that he lived on. Christopher was Malcolm's legacy per say, the one to carry the name in case things were to go bad. I nodded again and just gave him another tight hug before both exited the room and walked through the door that connected house to the garage and a few seconds later, the truck's door slamming were heard and the engine roared to life as the garage door was lifted and it drove out, then the garage door shut and they sped off to go do their thing.

Looking around the house, I stared blankly and studied the house. If anyone were to break in or anything, the most they would get would be clothes, some food and the bikes along with the ATV as they were in the garage, and some of the food was in the kitchen, as the clothes were obviously in the rooms. Oh and some of the weapons that Malcolm and Kaylee had from their personal arsenals. But most of their arsenals, along with the supplies, and large amounts of our food that wasn't in the supply caches were in the bunker locked away. Only two keys were around for it, one remained on Malcolm the entire time, while the other was on either myself or Kaylee when we stayed and watched Christopher so in case of us needing to, we could run and hide in the bunker.

The bunker like I said and described was underneath the small shed. So what it was, was the shed was a eight foot long, eight foot wide, and eight feet tall structure made out of concrete, Inside of it was all wooden furniture, deceiving from what it looked like on the outside. But in one of the corners not blocked by a shelf, was a hidden trap door. Once lifted, there was a small shaft made of concrete as well that led about 30 feet down, with a ladder on one side to climb down. Once reaching the bottom, was a 10 foot clearing and space, walking down the clearing led to a metallic door that required the specific key to open the large vault like bunker, and once inside, was the gold mine of what we had, a large 30 foot long, and 20 foot wide room with everything we would require to survive and become a small surviving group. At the end of the bunker, was a surface elevator that would take us back up and the hatch covered by a fake Dog house would slide away, explaining how Malcolm's father got all of the big and bulky objects down into the bunker.

Speaking of dogs, Roxanne came trotting down the stairs, her tail wagging softly behind her as she trotted over to where I was. Looking at her, she just nuzzled my hand and licked it a couple of times before whining. Smiling, I crouched and scratched her behind her ear, while petting him under her chin and scratched it as well, which received several tail and leg thumping's and a pant which meant she was enjoying it immensely. After several seconds I stopped and smiled looking into her eyes as she leaned forward and gave me a sloppy wet lick across my cheek and barked quietly obviously happy now.

"Hungry girl?" I asked her and stood up walking back to the kitchen and she barked twice in acknowledgement following happily after me. Somehow she knew the basic words, food, water, bathroom, stay, guard, search, and a few others, but she understood what she said and knew how to respond. Reaching the kitchen, I quickly grabbed two bowls, filling one with water, and reached over grabbing the large bag of dry dog food and poured it heading into the other bowl, before putting the bag back and zipping it up again. Grabbing both bowls, I placed them down onto the floor and she slowly trotted over and waited for me to remove my hands before beginning to eat the dry food, listening to it crunch and break inside of her large canine mouth.

Sighing, I looked at my own watch to see what time it was, 6:15 A.M. They weren't kidding when they said this was going to be different and more unique. Usually the scavenging started around seven in the morning at the earliest, but I guess they had to leave early since they were going to be scavenging more buildings and areas in one day, then we usually did per day. Plus the places were all over the town, so it would take time getting from place to place. And if they ran into trouble, it would take even more time to do everything. I walked over and opened a cabinet grabbing a box and reached inside grabbing three small brown packets before tossing the box back inside lazily and closing the cabinet.

Grabbing a bowl now for myself, I ripped all three of the packets opened at once and poured the powdery substance into the bowl and turned the sink back on, filling the bowl about halfway before turning the water back off and tossed the bowl into the microwave, activating it for a minute and half. While waiting for the bowl to heat up and my breakfast to as well, I looked back down at Roxanne who was lapping and slurping water from the bowl, some of it splashing onto the white tiled floor, making a small mess. Stuff and the small moments like these were almost making me believing it was just another normal day, but then quickly the dream was shattered as each of us were carrying a gun and ready to shoot first ask questions later. Speaking of guns I needed to go grab my guns and still get dressed. So once the microwave dinged, I grabbed the bowl and pulled it out, placing it on the kitchen counter and then let it cool off, and headed back up stairs.

Opening the door back to the room me and Kaylee shared, I looked around at several Halo, Army, and Supernatural posters that were plastered around the walls. It used to be Malcolm's old room, but we moved in, even before the invasion, as he moved into his father's room, and Christopher just stayed in his room. Walking to the closet, I quickly kicked off the sweat pants and pulled on a pair of skinny jeans myself, before reaching down and pulled on a pair of socks and then the combat boots myself. Pulling off the tank top I slept in, I grabbed a fresh clean one, sliding it on as well, and then pulled on a red and black checkered plaid shirt, before sliding on my own leather jacket. With the new clothes, I felt the cold metal of my own personal dog tags press against my collarbone. Looking around, I found just tied my hair into a ponytail and then grabbed the hair tie to make sure it stayed that way.

"Why not." I whispered to myself and grabbed a pair of sunglasses and hooked them on the front of my tank top, before pulling on my own cap, and slid my ponytail through the small hole in the back of the hat between the adjuster for the head size, and the top of it. Dressed and warming up, I went over to grab my weapons. Since I was a hand to hand person, I had actually learned and mastered the use of nun chucks and grabbed them first tucking them into my belt, before grabbing a knife tucking it into the sheath attached to my belt as well, Grabbing my own Glock, I tucked it into my shoulder holster, that Malcolm had built into the inside of the leather jacket so it was easy to reach instead of blindly reaching down at my leg or hip trying to find the right place for the hilt of the pistol, and finally, I grabbed the M4 carbine and slung it across my shoulder, letting the rifle hang across my back, the barrel pointing down, and the butt stock between my right shoulder and head visible at the crook of my neck.

Sighing as the rifle felt like a ton to me, sometimes wishing I didn't even need it, sometimes even wishing for the Hell on Earth before the invasion. But then looking at what's what happened, what we have all been through, I realize things could be a lot worst. A small smile began to creep across my as the good came back for me to recognize and realize. Things were a lot better than the past, I couldn't dwell on it, needed to be strong just like everyone else. Creeping slowly out of the room, and closing it, the door silently behind me, and walking back down the hall.

"No, leave them…. alone. Take… take me." Hearing the distraught voice, I stopped and looked around before hearing it again and peered through Christopher's doorway to see him tossing and turning, beginning to talk in his sleep. Seeing this, I frowned and tried to think to myself with what to do. I was never as good with kids as Kaylee or Malcolm were, I did my best but just couldn't handle it sometimes. They were so innocent, and sweet not even knowing what was happening, or they did and were being forced to deal with it. Watching him squirm and move around some more, nearly thrashing and talking still. I walked through the door and into the room slowly and thought about what to do. Not even bother to take off my weapons or anything, I just crawled into the bed and wrapped an arm against him and pulled him against me, running a hand through his short hair and whispering soothing words to him. Bit by bit he began to calm down and go back to a peaceful sleep, but I didn't move, not wanting to disturb him. Seeing him like this, it broke my heart, truly did to see this. Roxanne slowly walked into the room as well and hopped back onto the bed and circled a couple of times before lying down at the foot of the bed near the door and watched us both for a second.

"Good girl." I smiled and whispered to her again softly before yawning, moving my hand from Christopher's hair and petted her fur gently for a couple of seconds then pulled away. Looking around, I just took the hat and sunglasses off of me and placed them on the bedside table, the weapons stayed though only providing a small discomfort, moving the carbine around my back slightly, to get part of it to not be sticking in my back. I closed my eyes enjoying the warmth both the dog and Chris provided against me. "Maybe I can sleep for a couple more hours." I whispered before drifting off into it, the words like the unspoken key to letting me open the door back to slumber.

CRACK! Jerking up, more gunshots were heard this time getting closer and along with them were small shouts. Looking down, Christopher was still asleep, like the noise wasn't even fazing him, god he was a heavy sleeper. "Guess no rest for the wicked." I murmur and groan softly standing up and slide on my sunglasses this time and also putting on the cap looking around. Creeping to the window, I saw what was happening and swallowed, feeling like a deer in the headlights, all I could do was to watch and stare, I wanted to help but couldn't do it. Outside were two people, two males, looking like brothers and both were wearing SWAT uniforms, armed with M16A4 assault rifles. Man I hated guns, I may be a good shot but absolutely hated them for several reasons why. But living and surviving with Kaylee, and Malcolm, I knew weapons and guns from just the look and certain aspects of it, also with this, I knew what the weapons shot, and how to take the weapons apart and back together entirely.

The men wearing the uniforms ducked into the house across the street, taking cover behind a destroyed car, both of them were reloading as well. Then that's when they came, a dozen skitters from three directions, except from behind them. The two SWAT members saw them, one popped up and fired in three round bursts, and when his weapon ran dry and had to reload, he ducked behind the car and the other stood back up firing in turn. Four skitters went down with the total of 60 rounds, the rest were starting to swarm. Two pounced on one and with the armor of his uniform, it blocked some of the scratches and the man pulled his pistol out shoving it into the creature's mouths and pulled the trigger blowing both of their brains out. The other man though wasn't so lucky, the skitters seeing this, tugged on him and ripped the man apart in half, his finger almost likely on muscle reflex slammed onto the trigger and his rifle was on full auto firing rounds everywhere. The other man seeing this tried to get up to run, but they caught him, except his fate wasn't as painful as the other man, he was just simply decapitated and blood sprayed across the man's uniform along with staining the green grass.

"We can't do anything, I wish we could." Hearing the voice in what seemed the silence was haunting along with the thoughts that were coming across and forming inside of my head. Turning slowly, Chris was just staring at me now, and guessing from the gunshots and screams of pain and death, he knew what was happening and going on, He was a smart kid, no doubt about it.

"You know kid, with how stealthy you are, you remind me of Kaylee and myself getting into trouble during our elementary school days." I told him and just sat down next to him and smiled weakly, wiping some small trickles of sweat that seemed to have formed across his head. He was already dressed though, and not having realized it, he even had his boots on ready to jump out of bed, he was even more prepared and paranoid.

"Tell me please, I want to hear this, you two are so walled off. I get it and I understand, but please just tell me this one time. Humor me please." He was practically begging and had these puppy dog eyes that were so hard to refuse. We tried to and usually could only if I and Kaylee were working together, backing each other up. But if we were apart, all our walls crumbled because he just got to us, it was hard to ignore him at times. Sighing and seeing nothing other to do since he just woke up, I shook my head and chuckled dryly.

"Kaylee was one of the stealthiest and badass people I know. Both of our brothers were in high school at the time. Womanizers, completely cocky, and arrogant sons of bitches you would ever see. But they were our brothers, you can't replace blood sometimes, no matter how hard it is, and how hard it seems to show they either care, or they do care, but family is family. Anyways the brothers both played football together, had a major rival with another school. So while the brothers went and spray painted the schools, we were supposed to go and trash the office, and then spray paint it the colors as well. We got caught and soon after cops came rounded us all out, charged with assault and battery along with possession of a deadly weapon."

"What happened, how did you all get caught? Why did you get charge with the charges as well?" He asked me curiously and his expression didn't change from shock or anything, he didn't even seem fazed like our image wasn't even changed when he was finding out about this.

"One of the school's students found us and what we were doing. He threatened to tell, so we beat the living shit out him, every single one of us. Kaylee was the one charged with the weapon as she had a gun on her like usual, so that shouldn't surprise you. All I can say is, is that you remind me of her by the way you sneak around, you're like kid Special Forces." I told him and he smiled softly listening as he just looked at me, but then walked up and hugged me tightly as he quoted what Chris had told Kaylee and myself when we finally had spilled everything to him.

"It doesn't matter what has happened in your past. What does matter is what you do now, and what we do for each other. We watch out for each other, we are a family." He told me softly and with that my heart melted and hugged him back, Kaylee and myself still had plenty of secrets from these two unfortunately and we couldn't just tell it all, some of it was still pretty bad. But if this is how Chris would respond as well, maybe we could start opening up a little more at the time now, and just make it as close and as caring for the family we could.

"Come on kid let's go eat." I whispered to him gently remembering my oatmeal that was most likely cold, but still food was food and we both were hungry now as I heard a distinct low rumble emerge from each of us. He nodded enthusiastically and chuckled grinning now as well he slowly stood up and grabbed his weapons, but pulled his pistol out of his holster and just slid it into the back of his jeans and tucked it in. But we were ready to go so we just made our way downstairs, myself going straight towards the oatmeal and began to slowly shovel the food down my throat, as it still tasted great. But Chris walked to the back door and opened it as Roxanne waited patiently before bolting to the backyard that was surrounded by a eight foot white picket fence. Big enough for the dog to run around, and use its business as well. Chris closed the door, and opened the dog hatch so she could crawl back in.

Chris finally walked over and looked through the food, before finding a box of cereal and just poured it into a bowl dry before walking over and sat down next to me across the table. He used a spoon still and just continued to eat the bowl and was smiling happily. We were enjoying our meal, almost reminding me of a happy family eating breakfast before school or just heading off to a day out in the town. I sometimes wish it were that easy as well, but life was unfair, you get dealt a handful of cards, you had to deal with them and use them to the best of your abilities, and we fucking did every single damn day.

"Hey can we have a lesson today? We haven't had much of a chance to continue our lessons and I don't want to get rusty with fighting. Granted we've just fought skitters the entire time, but you never know when someone might come along, and they won't be so friendly." He told me, listening to him I nodded every time and a slight sparkle came across my showing that I was absolutely happy and ok with us having a fight lesson today. So he began to scarf his food down as well and soon enough we went down to the basement that was padded, and filled with weights and other strength and conditioning equipment. We went at it for three hours, and by the time we were done, we had worked up a sweat and had gotten a little rough with each other as he had a busted and bloody nose, along with myself having a slight come from stumbling back and my head bumping into a weight.

We went back up and to our surprise the couch was filled with scavenging from the first phase of the scavenging plan and trip. Several folded piles of jeans, shirts, flannel and plaid button up shirts, and even a couple denim jackets, maybe four of the most. On the floor were also several pairs of cowboy boots, honest to god country cowboy boots, not a big fan but they were nice, something I could wear other than my old beat up tennis shoes when I was just lounging or staying at the house. Next to it were a couple piles of some rope, some water bottles, a couple boxes of shotgun shells, multi tools, and then the final piece that was on top of the pile. A crossbow, with a full quiver of arrow bolts. It was beautiful, and could be reused for silent purposes. Looking around, I saw a piece of paper and walked over to read it.

"Found supplies, clothes, and some other things we could use. The Sporting Goods, and the Hardware store were infested with Skitters and even a mech or two at least at each of them. Should be home before eight keep out of trouble. And keep out of trouble we did, we'll see you soon." The writing was in sloppy and quick hand writing, it was obviously Malcolm's as well. But we did as asked, laying low and waited for several hours. Finally we heard and saw the headlights of the truck and walked to the garage. With what happened next, I would have thought all hell would break loose.

 **Malcolm's POV**

"What the Hell happened to you." Alyssa's voice ran out and walked over to me as she slapped me hard across the face, granted she was a foot shorter, but her fighting made up for it. She was staring at my leg as she saw the bandage as well. Chris came running around the edge of the truck and saw it as well stopping dead in his track, as if the blood was draining from his face and then Chris turned to Kaylee mad, I had never seen him like that before at all.

"You promised to keep him safe, you let him get injured what happened Parker?" Chris used her last name and he was blaming her. I couldn't let that happen, I was about to say something when I heard the engines of motor bikes outside of the garage and then they turned off, people hopping off of the bikes and my eyes widened.

"Stow that away and put it up damnit, we will talk about this later. Right now get inside and head towards the storage we may have to sacrifice this if they are here for a fight." I whisper and growled to them all, everyone's eyes were on me, but they slowly nodded and we began to get military as we called it. Each of us shouldered our weapons, all of us even glanced at the truck that was loaded with fuel, food, ammunition, and even more weapons. I didn't want to sacrifice it, but I would if I had to do it. It was all useless if I lost anyone of these people. Kaylee reached in and grabbed the ACR she wanted and made sure it was loaded before beginning to walk towards the door, now having four weapons on her and being slightly weighed down. I kept the 1895 slung and reached inside grabbing my M16A4 shouldering it.

"I'll take point." I whispered and slowly began to walk inside of the house. Then Chris followed, Alyssa, and Kaylee as our rear guard. Beginning to finally reach the living room, my heart was pounding, adrenaline rushing through me. I was ready to go, I wanted to just leave and get them out, but I couldn't not with people right outside. That's when three blinding lights filled the room from different angles of the room.

"Drop your weapons, I said drop them!" A voice rang out from one of the lights, but instead all four of us raised our weapons pointing at the lights and soon enough, one of us actually turned on a light switch showing that the power still worked. Everyone turned away from the light for a second before snapping back up and pointing weapons at each other. "Ones wounded, so we shouldn't have to worry." The man, correction teenager commented and the three looked at each other the other two uneasy and not liking the way things were going.

"No you drop yours, and we'll see if we can actually talk things out, maybe letting your weapons come back to you." Kaylee shouted and then did something that had me never doubt her marksmanship again. She shot each of their guns out of their hands, at the point not to cause damage, but enough to have them drop it from the sparks. Quickly the three of us walked over and grabbed the guns, while Kaylee covered us.

"Line up against the wall now, backs to us, hands over your head." I barked at them and they reluctantly did it as they were told. I didn't bother getting a good look at each of them, we had enough time to do that later. "I want the lights out, and some candles lit now for lighting." I told my people and they quickly did as ordered, Chris turned the lights out, while Kaylee and Alyssa went to go and get the candles. Waiting for the them, I asked one question that came to my mind.

"Where are you from and who are you?"

"The Second Mass."


End file.
